I know perfectly well that this complaint won’t have much traction with people who work real jobs and lead real lives, BUT: I was literally shaking with outrage at the state of affairs at last night’s screening of War of the Worlds. Ok, so they’re all scared about people pirating their movie and selling bootleg copies on the streets of lower Manhattan or the internet or whatever. This leads to security guards, not just to look through your backpack or purse, no, but to confiscate your belongings, holding them in numbered plastic bags for the duration of the screening, like a compulsory coat check. Then, the airport wand, for which you open your jacket and turn around three times, answering whatever invasive questions the retard (sorry, retarded people actually have integrity) with the plastic badge sees fit to ask, then you might be allowed inside. Is it crazy to think that a culture of suspicion and nastiness (supervised, OF FUCKING COURSE, by middle aged min wagers with no sense of tact, or delicacy, despite the fact that they’re in charge of your personal belongings, without anyone watching them to see if they’re rifling through for fun or profit)

might be part of the reason that people aren't running to the malls to see the terrible films these studios pump out like so much bilge from a rusty old frigate? I was mildly chagrined to learn that no one else seemed to have a problem with the treatment, so I guess I just have a particularly raw nerve for this kind of authoritarian bullshitI mean, it's not like these are off-duty cops, either. These are full-blooded, brochure clutching, tinhorn, couldn't make it work at the collection agency rent-a-pigs, snarfing at a foul trough, and I hope every fucking one of them rots in a hell of their own design forever. And they're not even the ones I'm really mad at. The studios deserve a far worse fate, and if the world of bittorrent is any indication, it's coming.

Also: no contraband was discovered in their exhaustive search of the hundreds of patrons, so, yeah, at least all that hassle was worth it. If I hadn't been working, I'd have puked in their faces and walked away.

The movie was pretty good, though.